1991 :: Madonna
March 25th, 1991, Madonna and Michael attend the Oscars together
March 25th 1991, Michael and Madonna at Oscars After Party
2000/1 Schmuley tapes, Michael talks about Madonna
April, 2003, Madonna defends Michael over the Bashir documentary
July 5th 2009, Madonna pays tribute to Michael during her concert at the 02
13, Sept, 2009 Madonna Eulogises Michael on MTV
13, Sept, 2009, Madonna backstage after MTV speech
1983
In 1983, an upcoming singer had just scored her first international hit, 'Holiday'. Determined to be more than a one-hit wonder, she contacted Freddy DeMann, manager of the world's most successful pop star - Michael Jackson. In fact, Jackson had recently hired a new manager, which left DeMann free to devote his attention to the lesser-known, but fiercely ambitious Madonna. Madonna, Smashits, 1984: "I thought, who's the most successful person in the music industry and who's his manager? I want him."
Madison Square Gardens, Victory Tour, 4 August, 1984,
Michael and Madonna had first met in 1984, when she watched his Victory Tour at Madison Square Garden, New York. Pictures of Madonna from that night:
Madonna, Smash Hits Dec 30 1987/Jan 12 1988
NEIL: Was there anyone you aspired to be like?
MADONNA: Well, when I was younger I really liked girl singers like Lulu and those kind of innocent, angelic voices, Marianne Faithfull and that kind of stuff, plus Diana Ross and all the girl groups of the '60s like the Motown girl groups. Then when I got older my idols shifted 'cos there weren't really any female singers I could aspire to be like. From then on I went through an "I want to be like Michael Jackson" phase. I can do everything he can do only I'm a girl! I still idolise him above any performer. He transcends almost every level, appeals to everyone.
NEIL: Is that what you want to do?
MADONNA: Yeah.
[...]
NEIL: How did you get to be managed by Michael Jackson's manager (in those days) Freddy DeMann?
MADONNA: I thought "I must have a manager." I thought 'Who's the most successful person in the music industry and who's his manager? I want him." I went out to L.A. to meet him and at the time he was Michael Jackson's manager. He came out to New York and saw a show at Studio 54 (famous disco club in the early '80s) I did for Fiorucci and I was so nervous because Michael Jackson's so incredible live and I thought "If he thinks Prince is terrible - which he did - what can I do?" Then he liked the show.
Madonna, Song Talk, Summer, 1989
Interviewer: You, Prince and Michael Jackson were all born in the same year, 1958-
Madonna: I know. Isn't that weird? And I think Michael's birthday is right near mine, in August…there are so many Leos in my life. I'm August 16.
Interviewer: The three of you have had such an enormous effect on popular music. Yet recently it seems that both Prince's and Michael Jackson's connection with the world has weakened while yours has strengthened and become more intimate and personal. Do you feel that?
Madonna: Yes. I think because I stay in touch with the world, and I think that Michael Jackson and Prince have really isolated themselves. And they live very isolated lives. There's so much fearfulness and so much inhibition that comes with when you become a celebrity and you're in the public eye all the time; I think you really have to fight that temptation to go into hiding and surround yourself with people who protect you and keep life out from you. I don't want to live that way. I don't want to crawl into a hole. I don't want to go around with six bodyguards, you know?
On The Possibility of Dancing With Michael Jackson:
"I'd love to, but I don't think he'd like it. I think he has a shyness when it comes to women. He'd probably rather die than dance with me."
Crotch Grabbing, 1984/1989
Michael had started to use the crotch-grab as a dance move during the 1984 Victory tour but it became infamous when he incorporated it into his Bad video in 1987. Two years later Madonna used it in her Express Yourself video and again in following tours.
"When Madonna did it in her music video for the aptly titled song, "Express Yourself," critics were shocked by the "crude" and "obscene" move, even calling it "unladylike." (Come on, people, we're talking about Madonna!) Madonna herself would counter that Michael Jackson did it first. Her point - women should be allowed, even empowered, to do anything men could."
Ivy Restaurant, March 15, 1991
Michael & Madonna go dining together at the Ivy restaurant in Los Angeles .
Press:
Magic and Madness, J Randy says:
According to JRandy Michael has said,"'I had my sunglasses on,' he told J. Randy Taraborrelli, recalling their first 'date'. 'And I'm sitting there, you know, trying to be nice. And the next thing I know, she reaches over and takes my glasses off. Nobody has ever taken my glasses off…And, then, she throws them across the room and breaks them. I was shocked. 'I'm your date now,' she told me, 'and I hate it when I can't see a man's eyes.' I didn't much like that.'
Madonna's version: "We drove to the restaurant in my car. It was dark out, but he was still wearing sunglasses. I said, 'Michael, I feel like I'm talking to a limousine, do you think you could take off those glasses so I could see your eyes?' He paused for a moment, then he tossed the glasses out the window, looked at me with a wink and a smile and said, 'Can you see me now, is that better?'
"In that moment, I could see both his vulnerability and his charm."
March 16, 1991
"We're at the Ivy, and Madonna and Michael Jackson are there together. It was me and Greg Deguire, and an AP [Associated Press] guy," recalls photographer Vinnie Zuffante. We wait for her to come out, and we hear she's with Michael Jackson, we didn't believe it. So we see them and they're walking out and the maitre d' says no wait I don't want them getting any pictures"
Both Madonna and Michael said, 'It's OK - no problem.' He said, 'No, not at myrestaurant.' He takes Michael Jackson's hand, walks Michael Jackson to his limo. He goes back, gets Madonna, walks Madonna to the limo. He has the waiters come out, and the busboys, holding up tablecloths, and putting menus in our faces, so that we couldn't get pictures. So I hit him in the head twice with the camera - the maitre d'. Madonna says, ' It's OK, you don't have to do this,' and the maitre d' is saying, 'Not in front of my restaurant.' He's hitting me, I hit him in the head With the camera. Madonna starts laughing.
It was crazy."
Mar 18, 1991
Madonna and Michael Jackson are seen in separate photos as they leave the Ivy restaurant in Los Angeles after dining together Saturday night. The two pop stars caused a commotion when restaurant employees battled with photographers.
March 20, 1991
Madonna and Michael Jackson have decided to mix their professional magnetism. "They're working on a musical project," say Madonna's spokeswoman Liz Rosenberg. Record? Video? Concert? "I can't elaborate," Rosenberg says. They don't even know if they'll work for her label, or his.
They have been friends for a long time, Rosenberg says, but the decision to mesh musicalities was "fairly recent." Saturday night, the duo was spotted having dinner together at Los Angeles' Ivy restaurant Jackson is "just finishing" his long-overdue album, says his manager Bob Jones, who expects it in stores by June. Could Madonna be in there? "If (he) comes up with something great, it could be" Jones says.
Fresno Bee, March 22, 1991
Why were Michael Jackson and Madonna dining together the other night? It was strictly professional - they are planning to record together.
Academy Awards, March 25, 1991
Michael & Madonna attend the Academy Awards ceremony together.
When he went to the Oscars with Madonna, "it was pouring rain, the limo door opened and Michael got out first," she told PEOPLE. "I got out right after him, and my bodyguard leaves with Michael under the umbrella. I was left standing in the rain. It was so fascinating to see how people responded to him."
Madonna biography, Blonde Ambition, Mark Bego:
According to Vinnie Zuffante, although they were both already on the premises,the superstar couple was originally going to stage their arrival for the cameras, but that move was nixed by ceremony organizers. Says Zuffante, "Madonna and Michael wanted to make the entrance, but they were warned by the Academy not to. They had all the security. What the Oscars did was tell all the fans they can't have any signs, they can't have any cameras, and they can't have any binoculars. They were doing that for security reasons, and mainly because Michael Jackson and Madonna were going to go through. But the Academy realized that Madonna and Michael were going to get more publicity than anyone else going there, and they didn't want that to happen. They weren't nominees. If Madonna and Michael walked through the front every magazine would have had that picture on page one, instead of Kevin Costner with his Oscar."
A seat filler talks of her night with Michael:
People actually do this? That's often the response when you tell someone about seat fillers. Yes, at every televised awards show from the Oscars to the People's Choice, there are grown men and women whose sole purpose is to wait in the lobby until, say, Richard Gere gets up to receive an award. At that moment, a seat filler scurries down to take his seat. When Gere comes back, the filler retreats.
Hollywood's awards season lasts from September to March, encompassing more than a dozen shows that salute everything from soap operas to rap music. Seat fillers are just as varied.They range from college students to retired people, from secretaries to physicians. Most of them want to see celebrities. "For a poor working girl, getting the chance to rub elbows with stars is a once-in-a-lifetime experience," said Doris Hemphill, a 47-year-old switchboard operator.
But some fillers prefer to watch the frantic directors and switching cameras. Others enjoy the performances, especially at American Music or Soul Train awards.It's not too difficult to get into the smaller shows. To work to the Academy Awards, you have to go through ABC and a gentleman named Joseph DiSante, who has gathered and supervised the fillers for the last 19 Oscar nights.
"Last year I used 300 for the Emmys, and I turned away at least that many," said Deborah McCormick, a Fox network official.
"The Emmys, the Oscars-it's a closed society. This is the only way other people get to go."
And for every sob story, there is a seat filler's triumph. For Beth Anderson, who has worked about a dozen Academy Awards shows, that moment finally arrived last year. "Madonna did a number at the beginning," Anderson said. "They told me I was going to sit in her seat in the front row. They told me the other seat was for her escort, but I didn't know who that would be.
"Two seconds before the show started, Michael Jackson sat down," the aerospace worker said.
"I looked at him. He looked at me."
The two of them ended up chatting for half an hour until Madonna returned. "He asked me what I thought about this and that," she said."
When Madonna came back to her seat, I got up and she said, `Hey, thanks for keeping my seat warm.'
The queen of seat fillers, [Beth Anderson], will make another Oscar appearance. Chances are, she won't get the front row next to [Michael Jackson] again. But if she is stuck in the lobby, Anderson knows enough to check the bar."The stars get bored and hang around down there," she said. Like being inside a bottle of Champagne-that's how Anderson describes being at the Oscars. "The whole effervescence of the evening," she said. "Every year I say I'm not going to do it. I say I'm going stay home and watch on television. But then I think about it. "And the smell. The perfumes of some of these stars, I couldn't afford them in my dreams. It smells gorgeous."
Press:
The Sun, 7 April, 1991
Pop stars Michael Jackson and Madonna have fallen in love, it was claimed last night.
Rumours of a romance are brewing round Hollywood after the multi-millionaire duo were spotted sharing an intimate dinner.
The three hour meal at Spago restaurant in Los Angeles was their fourth date in two weeks.
Fellow diners say 32 year old acko looked to be starting something. The couple first caused a commotion two weeks ago when they turned up at the Oscars ceremony together - and spent the night giggling in the front row.
Pals of Madonna, 32, say she fancies Jacko like mad and won't stop till she gets enough.
One Hollywood expet said, "It's the talk of the town. At first every one thought the idea of a romance was a joke.
"But the more they go out, the more believable it becomes. They look blissfully happy."
If they are in love, Madonna will be Jackso's first real girlfriend.
The pair plan a duet single next month.
The Bulletin, 5 April, 1991
The 1991 award for Fun Couple at the Oscars had to go to Madonna and Michael Jackson. Television viewers were still wiping the steam off their television screens from Madonna's bodytalk rendition of "Sonner or Later (I Always Get My Man)" when a camera panning the Shrine Auditorium audience zeroed in on the two singers sitting together in the front row.
There had been a Madonna-Michael Jackson sighting a week earlier during the busy lunch hour at the Ivy restaurant, a popular industry hangout in West Hollywood. Then, after the Academy Awards, the Talks of the Town showed up at Swifty Lazar's apres Oscar party at Spago, where Daily Variety columnist Army Archard asked Madonna how she got Jackson out for the evening. "Michael's coming out more," she said.
Since being seen together at these venues is often the point of going, Hollywood insiders are naturally wondering what it all means? A Madonna-Michael Jackson album? A movie? So far, no rumours of a romance.
A source who knows both pop superstars well says that Madonna and Jackson hit it off at a party last month and have been hanging out a lot - and talking business a little - ever since. But any talk of a merger has been confined to recording a duet or two, and though Son's Columbia might like to have MAdonna as a bonus to the mega-deal it just signed with Jackson, the sources says there is no movie in the offing.
Spago Restaurant, April 9, 1991
Michael & Madonna go to the Spago restaurant in Los Angeles . Michael offers to do a duet with her on the song In The Closet but she refuses.
As anyone burdened with stardom knows, finding a date for the Oscars can be an enormo pain. After all, really famous folk simply can't be seen with some sweet nobody who waves "Hi Mom" at the camera and spends the evening worrying about credit-card approval at Spago.
And so it was, when Madonna and Michael Jackson, Earth's top pop stars, faced the who-is-famous-enough-to-be-seen-with-me quandary, they hit on the perfect solution. Since they were already planning a duet for Michael's upcoming album, Dangerous, and since they both happened to be on all Hollywood's collagen-enhanced lips anyway-he for his ballyhooed "billion-dollar" contract with Sony, she for her upcoming, already controversial self-ploitation film, Truth or Dare-why not date…each other?
Big dates can also become big disasters, however. So a week before the Oscars, the couple met at L.A.'s Ivy restaurant to plan and, perhaps, trade makeup tips. By Oscar night, all was ready. Michael looked positively legendary in gold-tipped cowboy boots, a blinding diamond brooch and-in a dramatic sartorial departure-two gloves. Madonna, awash in peroxide and pluck, diverted at least some of the attention from her low-cut, pearl-encrusted Bob Mackie gown with $20 million in diamonds, on loan from jeweler Harry Winston. They entered L.A.'s Shrine Auditorium and promptly collected their well-deserved Best Seat honors-front row, two on the aisle.
All seemed fine at first. Michael applauded as Madonna out-Marilyned Marilyn in a vampy rendition of Stephen Sondheim's Oscar winning "Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man)." And it seemed everyone agreed that the ermined minx stole the show.
Afterward, things got a little dicey, for Michael at least, when the couple arrived at Spago for Swifty Lazar's annual Oscar bash. After whispering and giggling in Michael's ear, the Material Girl abandoned her one-night Boy Toy and hopped over to Warren Beatty's table, where heavy breathing and light petting ensued. "He fondled her all over," says a dedicated observer.
But all turned out fine. Michael, tit-for-tat, dandled Diana Ross on his lap before Madonna returned and joined him for a grand exit. Strobes flashed and the partyers cheered-even though everyone seemed to understand that Michael and Madonna's big night out was about as romantically valid as taking your cousin to the prom. So just what were they up to?
Newsday, April 18, 1991
Are Madonna and Michael Jackson up to the kissing stage yet? As unbelievable as it may seem, we hear Madonna has confided (OK, blabbed) that she and Jackson "suck face," but that's as far as their relationship goes.
Buffalo News, May 5, 1991
On what she was doing Oscar night hanging out with Michael Jackson:
"We have been working on a song. The question was, will it be a song that's out on his next album or will it be something we do at some point in the future? Right now, it's going to be something we do in the future, because I don't want to make the commitment to it. I'm trying to concentrate on my film career right now. To work with him, I'd have to spend a lot of time in the studio - videos and all that kind of stuff. It's not what I want to do."
Toronto Star, May 5, 1991
Michael Jackson may have accompanied Madonna to the recent Academy Awards, but he doesn't think much of her as an entertainer, a new unauthorized biography of the gloved one says. "She just isn't that good. Let's face it, she can't sing and she's just an okay dancer," Jackson is quoted as saying according to author J Randy Taraborrelli.
Madonna, The Advocate, May 7, 1991
Madonna: I keep telling Michael Jackson, "I'd love to turn Jose and Luis on you for a week." They pull you out of the shoe box you're in. Anybody who's in a shoe box in the closet cannot be in one after hanging around with Luis and Jose. Or me, for that matter.
I have this whole vision about Michael. We're considering working on a song together. I would like to completely redo his whole image, give him a Caesar - you know, that really short haircut - and I want to get him out of those buckly boots and all that stuff. What I want him to do is go to New York and hang out for a week with the House of Xtravaganza [ a group of voguers]. They could give him a new style. I've already asked Jose and Luis if they would do it. They're thrilled and ready. I said, "Could you give this guy a make-over for me?" because I think that's really what he needs.
Advocate: Is he up for it?
Madonna: I don't know. He's up for a couple of things that surprise me. The thing is, I'm not going to get together and do some stupid ballad or love duet - no one's going to buy it, first of all. I said, "Look, Michael, if you want to do something with me, you have to be willing to go all the way or I'm not going to do it." He keeps saying yes.
ST Louis Post, May 9, 1991
IT LOOKS as if Michael Jackson has decided to take Madonna's advice and completely change his moldy fashion image. Jackson's representatives have been in touch with several major designers - including Giorgio Armani and Thierry Mugler - and have asked them to submit suggestions about how Jackson might update his sneaker-and-glove wardrobe.
USA Today, May 10, 1991
Do they follow the news of Madonna? Her dating Warren Beatty? A possible pairing with Michael Jackson? "I never see anything about her in the newspapers!" says Pittman, and adds: "Her personal life is too confusing." Her advice to the songstress: "Lighten up on the sex stuff."
Chicago Tribune, May 12, 1991
Madonna isn't even shy about giving advice to fellow superstar Michael Jackson, with whom she's now writing a song-"not for his next album as everyone says, but perhaps later," she explains.
St Petersburg Times, May 12, 1991
In Truth or Dare, Madonna is captured in staged contemplation, sprawled in the grass by her mother's grave. She also is filmed mothering her dancers and leading prayer sessions before each performance. "I guess I have an obsession with motherhood and mothering because I didn't have a mother," Madonna says. "All my life I have wondered what it would have been like if I had a mother. . I transfer those feelings to other people and try to be the mother I never had.I'm instinctively drawn to people who need mothering, so that I may live out this fantasy."
One such person, she says, is Michael Jackson, with whom she's supposed to record a duet. They were this year's hottest couple at the Academy Awards ceremony, where Madonna wore a pearl-encrusted Bob Mackie gown and $20-million worth of diamonds. Hollywood wags reported Madonna abandoned Jackson once they arrived at Swifty Lazar's post-Oscar party at Spago's, preferring to bump and grind on former beau Warren Beatty's lap.
Studio assistant on the Dangerous recording sessions:
-Madonna visited MJ in the studio exactly one time. They spent a little while in his "private" room in the back, and then she left. When I asked Micheal later about her visit, he said that she "scared" him.
I think we all speculated that she tried to make a "move" on him, but Michael never said. In any event, we never saw her again after that…
Chicago Tribune, May 14, 1991
… about her on-again off-again cross-dressing video with Michael Jackson (it's off again-"He ran away from me" the Material Girl told reporters Monday at the Cannes Film festival.
Extra, May, 21, 1991
Madonna, US Magazine, June 13, 1991
Did you think your stage show was shocking? How would you feel if you went to see George Michael and he pretended to masturbate onstage? Would that upset you?
It would depend on the context. It's hard to say, isn't it? I don't do any of those things without humour. It's a bit diffiicult for me to see someone like Michael Jackson grabbing his crotch and humping the ground simply because I feel he's a very androgynous person. I don't believe him. So it would depend how it's used.
Madonna, Rolling Stone, June 13, 1991
Carrie: I read you write songs in fifteen minutes.
Madonna: Yeah, but pop songs are really easy to write. Michael Jackson's been working on his album for something like three years. I can't imagine doing that! I'd go insane.
The Record, Jun 22, 1991
"Madonna is everything that Cher was and is, taken to the step of total outrageousness." He says [Michael Jackson] asked Madonna to the Oscars because he wanted to get people interested in the two of them making a record together.
But Madonna later decided not to pursue the musical collaboration. "I think she thinks of Michael Jackson the way Michael thought of tiny little Emmanuel Lewis," says Taraborrelli.
Rocky Mountain News, Sep 12, 1991
Madonna wanted to make Michael over, to play Henry Higgins to his Eliza Doolittle. But shy as he may be, Jackson is willful as well ("Nobody controls Michael Jackson," said his spokesman at the time), especially when Madonna threatened to send him for a week to the House of Xtravaganza, a clan of Harlem drag queens who are featured in her video Vogue.
Michael resisted, Madonna got bored, and that was the end. Their celebrity alliance served neither.
Boston Globe, Nov 24, 1991
She sounds suspiciously like an understated Madonna, who planned a duet on the album before she reportedly had a falling out with Jackson after he took her to the Oscars this year.
What others have said about Michael and Madonna during this year:
From Kit Culkin's (Macaulay's father) book Lost boy:
In a moment of unintended self-revelation, he [Michael Jackson] told me (with his hand cupped over his mouth in a gesture of "I shouldn't") about how a highly popular female entertainer (I'll withold the name) had once exposed herself to him (his words) just to see how he would react; a confession that caused him to visibly blush.
Andrew Morton's biography,
MADONNA has had her share of men, but she couldn't bag Michael Jackson. According to Andrew Morton's new biography, "Madonna," excerpted in People magazine, the Material Mom "told one of her lovers that she had tried to seduce [Jackson] shortly after the 1991 Oscars - but . . . failed to arouse his interest." According to the lover, Madonna and Jackson were on the couch at his place when she put the moves on him. When they touched he would start giggling like a little boy. Nothing happened, he was giggling so much - making Jackson "the man Madonna couldn't conquer."
Sandra Bernhard:
"Every time I call her she's either talking to or about Michael Jackson".
Press from this year:
Madonna, Michael and The Closet, USA Today, Mar 19, 1992
This time, the Dangerous One and Her Blondness are in the closet. Maybe. Tuesday, E! Entertainment Television reported that Madonna will appear in Jackson's upcoming video, In the Closet.
"That's not her voice, though it's obviously someone who sounds like Madonna." Rosenberg says Madonna, in L.A., will have no part of Jackson's video.
During Filming of Pepsi Commercial, 1992,
Someone who worked on a commercial with Madonna in 1992 remembers that Michael was also working on a commercial in a studio nearby. He said that Madonna walked in and Michael was telling him something like, "You know Madonna can be naughty, a bad girl. Sometimes she needs to be spanked." He hadn't realized Madonna was standing right behind him.
Seattle Times, October 16, 1992
Madonna breaks the unwritten codes of celebrity. When she was in the middle of planning a duet with Michael Jackson, she told the lesbian and gay magazine The Advocate how she wanted to change his image, get him to hang out with a gay dance troupe and write a song that "went all the way, not some stupid ballad or love duet." Jackson was reportedly horrified and the collaboration was called off.
"What, am I supposed not to tell things?"
No, but you seem to be breaking unwritten rules.
"Yeah, because I'm an outspoken person. I'm opinionated and people ask me things and I say them. If I don't want to say something I'll say I don't want to, but I don't understand why celebrities become celebrities and then spend the rest of their life hiding. I'm not ashamed of a lot of the things I do, so I don't feel like I have to hide it. Also a lot of interesting things happen to me and I like to tell interesting anecdotes."
Were you disappointed that the duet didn't happen?
"No, not at all."
You did sound very keen to make it special when you talked to The Advocate.
"No, I mean, I think Michael Jackson is a very talented man, but I think he's gone past a certain point. He operates in a world that I don't want any part of. I don't want to cut myself off from the world. I don't want to alienate myself from humanity. I could have pushed myself out into his world, but I've spent all my time trying to be in touch with people, and he spends all his time hiding, cloaking and padding things around himself. It's very evident when you see him work.
"Don't get me wrong, he's very talented, but I think he's killing himself. I was interested in working with that part of him. But there's so many other things in the way right now. I'm an artist who likes to be honest and confront; he operates in a completely different way. We're like oil and vinegar, oil and water. We just don't mix."
Chicago Sun Times, Nov 15, 1992
Singer Michael Jackson reportedly went shopping in an LA bookstore for Madonna's new book, Sex, wearing a black surgical mask and a baseball hat. The book was out of stock. No word on who Jackson startled next.
Blond Ambition Tour/Dangerous World Tour, Leothong vs Gaultier Corset, 1990/1992
"The body suits of the 1990s were generally worn by women, and then underneath pants. Jackson's body suits worn over his pants, served as inner-as-outwear, much as Madonna used Gautier's external corset/body suit in her Blond Ambition tour (1990). Though they were a female fashion, Jackson actually uses them to emphasize his crotch (Madonna did as well), both confusing gender lines and emphasizing male ones."
Bed Time Story vs Scream, 1995
There are some intriguing parallels between their later works. The video for Madonna's 'Bedtime Story', released in April 1995, was directed by Mark Romanek and showed Madonna alternating between a computerised, 'conscious' world and an inner life of fantasy, inspired by surrealist art. Romanek then directed Michael and Janet Jackson's 'Scream', released May 1995, in which they are trapped inside a computer.
The Spectator, Jan 25, 1996
Michael Jackson is furious after hearing Madonna is writing a kiss-and-tell book in which she claims she tried to have sex with him … and he didn't perform! The two singers were both stark-naked - but when the sexy blonde bombshell moved in on Michael, the King Of Pop froze, say sources. "Michael is mad as hell," a Jackson family insider revealed. "He told a friend: 'She's going to say that I couldn't. But what really happened was that I wouldn't. Madonna turned me off because she was so freaky!'"
September 7, Prague, History World Tour, 1996,
Reportedly, being pregnant with her first child made Madonna want to straighten out several things in her personal life that she regretted, one being her ongoing feud with Michael.
"In 1996, Madonna tried to mend their once short lived friendship with Jackson by placing a huge bouquet of flowers on stage for one of his concerts during his HIStory world tour. "
Michael, Life Magazine, December, 1997
Madonna, Spin, April 1998
Spin : You're one of the few celebrities who's grown up in public in a positive way.
Madonna : Me and Michael Jackson [laughs]. Yeah, I guess I have. I look at pictures of myself 15 years ago or watch myself on television or read interviews and I think, « Who is that ? » It's like looking at your high-school graduation picture and you sit there and go, « What a geek ! Why did I have my hair like that ?»
Spin : So many of your contemporaries have hit the skids, and even great talents like Prince, Michael Jackson, George Michael, U2, and R.E.M. are not so selling huge numbers, are not getting the same respect they once did. You're still selling records, still moving ahead creatively. Why is that ?
Madonna : Everybody you mentioned is extremely talented, so I don't think it has to do with talent. It's a tricky life we lead. You really have to find that place of caring but not caring what people think. Where you are desirous of things and you want to be successful and you want to make music that reaches people but you also can detach yourself from it. That's really hard to do.
Madonna Style Book, 1999
She cited Michael Jackson as an ally in her battle to break the mould of sexual stereotypes. "Michael Jackson isn't very masculine. He looks like Diana Ross. He has those beautiful doe eyes. He even talks like a girl and he's conquered the world."
Earth Song vs Don't Tell Me, 1995/2000
The video for another track from 1995, 'Earth Song', shows Michael and various tribal peoples grabbing the soil in their hands, in a gesture of despair. Madonna makes a similar gesture in her 2000 hit, 'Don't Tell Me', but its symbolic meaning is one of optimism and spiritual growth as she revisits the Midwest of her childhood.
Conversations With Rabbi Schmuley, 2000/1
SB: And by the way, that's what happened to Madonna. Madonna overexposed herself. She's still a celebrity but she's not what she was.
MJ: Yeah, I know.
SB: She didn't even overexpose herself, Michael, through TV and music. It wasn't that she gave too many interviews. Rather, she overexposed her body. She was a sex symbol. People wanted to know what her body looked like, and she did that stupid, sleazy, disgusting book, and all you had to was buy the book. The mystery was permanently gone.
MJ: I know. I know. Exactly, right.
[...]
SB: Like Madonna, who's often been criticized for taking advantage of the male sexual drive to sort of get all these guys hunkering after her to make her popular.
MJ: Yeah, uh huh. Aha.
[...]
SB: What about jealousy from other stars? Is there a lot of jealousy in your profession?
MJ: Absolutely. They admire you and know you are wonderful and great because they are jealous, because they wish they were in your shoes. And "M" is one of them. Madonna is one of them. She is jealous. She is a girl, a woman and I think that's what bothers her. I think women don't scream for other women. Men are too cool to scream for women. I get the fainting and adulation and she doesn't.
[...]
MJ:Madonna has never apologized.She is jealous.
SB:She wants to be the biggest star in the world?
MJ:Yes, she is jealous
SB:You can't understand that. You would say"What are you jealous for? You do your thing. I do my thing".
MJ:But at the same time she will come to my concert and cry. She comes there and tears rolling down her face for the song and the presentation of the song. There are some good qualities in her.
SB: There are good qualities in her. But you're saying she allows her jealousy to mask them at times. But if someone does that,they don't even have to ask for forgiveness because you will just forgive them?
MJ:Yes
[...]
SB: You have around some mean women, as well, who behave in a masculine-aggressive way, like Madonna. You told me that she can be mean.
[...]
MJ: Remember the line I told you? Madonna laid the law down to me before we went out. "I am not going to Disneyland, okay? That's out." I said, "But I didn't ask you to go to Disneyland." She said, "We are going to the restaurant and afterwards we are going to a strip bar." I said, "I am not going to a strip bar." Guys who cross-dress [note: House of Xtravaganza, Madonna talks about it in The Advocate]! Afterwards she wrote some mean things about me in the press and I wrote that she is a nasty witch, after I was so king to her. I have told you that we were at the table eating and some little kids came up. "Oh my God, Michael Jackson and Madonna. Can we have your autograph?" She said, "Get out of here. Leave us alone." I said, "Don't ever talk to children like that." She said, "Shut up." I said, "You shut up." That's how we were. Then we went out again and went to the Academy Awards and she is not a nice person. I have to say it. She is not a nice person.
SB: Did the people around you feel that it was important to be seen with her?
MJ: They knew nothing about it. This was totally between her and me.
SB: So you gave it a chance and it didn't work?
MJ: Yea, I gave it a chance like I try and give everything a chance.
SB: You basically saw that your values do not match those of most Hollywood people.
MJ: No, they do lots of crazy things that I am not into and at the time I was with Madonna she was into these boks, a whole library of women who were tied to walls. She said, "I love spanky books." Why do I want to see that?
SB: I think a lot of it is the image. She once said something to the effect that she would much rather read a good book than have sex. I think the other vulgar stuff is part of the outrageous image she tries to cultivate.
MJ: She's lying [about preferring to read a book]. I can't judge. I don't know if she has changed or if she [is] trying to claim she has changed.
SB: Why doe she say mean things?
MJ: I think she likes shock value and she knows how push buttons on people. I think she was sincerely in love with me and I was not in love with her. She did a lot of crazy things and that's how that went. I knew we had nothing in common. But I am pretty sure that having a baby has to change you. I don't know how much she has changed. I'm sure she is a better person than before.
SB: She has two children now.
MJ: Yea, I know. How would you like getting a phone call and she is telling you that she is putting her fingers between her legs. I would say, "Oh Madonna, please." She said, "What I want you to when I hung up the phone is rub yourself and think of me." That's the kind of stuff she says. She does. When I see her she says, "This is the finger I used last night." Wild, out of control.
SB: That kind of thing that Madonna was saying is only shocking at first. Then it quickly becomes humdrum and boring. That's why she has to push the envelope and become more and more shocking just to sustain our interest in her. When people have their breasts out the whole time then you stop looking. Do you see that as vulgar?
MJ: What she does? Absolutely. She is not sexy at all. I think sexy comes from the heart in the way you present yourself.
Michael Jackson, USA Today, 1 June, 2001
Q: But what about your trademark crotch-grabbing?
A: I started doing that with Bad. Martin Scorsese directed that short film in the subways of New York. I let the music tell me what to do. I remember him saying, "That was a great take! I want you to see it." So we pushed playback, and I went "Aaaah!" I didn't realize I was doing that. But then everyone else started doing that, and Madonna, too. But it's not sexual at all.
Madonna, J Randy's biography of her, 2001
Madonna was 25 before she released a record. She says this is important to understand. Prince signed to
Warners in his teens. Michael Jackson could see himself as a cartoon on TV as a child. Madonna had 25 years to live without scrutiny, to become an adult in a normal way, and this is why she is different.
"They isolate themselves too much," she says. "If they would just come outside and mingle with humanity, everything would benefit - their art, and whatever relationships they may have. They've made such a big deal about being secretive that now it's going to be even harder for them, because the more you say, `I'm not going to show you, you can't see', the more everybody wants to see. It's just the way it is.
"I could never say that either of them were friends. I've spent a good deal of time with both of them. They're very different people, but I felt the same with both. I felt like a peasant next to them, like this big clumsy farm girl. Like, when I'm hungry, I eat. When I'm thirsty, I drink. When I feel like saying something, I say it. And they have these manners and they're just so careful about what they eat and what they say. I had dinner with Prince once, and he was just sipping tea, very daintily. I was stuffing food down my face and I was like, `Aren't you going to eat?' " She mimics a delicate, whispered "no." And I thought, `Oh my God!' I have this theory about people who don't eat. They annoy the fuck out of me. It's something about being in control."
[...]
But going back to Prince and Michael Jackson, it's never too late to start being a human being. If they could just try being something close to that, then that would be the way to … I mean, f**k salvation in the public eye, I'm just talking about being happy in your private life. Just being able to go to a basketball game or for a bike ride. I can't imagine either of those guys putting on sweat pants and sneakers and going for a run, playing outside with a dog or just being silly and hanging out with your friends without your make-up on. You know what I mean? I don't think they do that."
[...]
Madonna was constantly searching for a companion more famous than the past one and that she finally found a man whose popularity surpassed hers: Michael Jackson, the most acclaimed singer of the decade.
They had a date at the Ivy, where they were constantly photographed, which didn't mind Madonna and Michael one bit. One week later they went Academy awards on march 25 1991.
It mentioned Madonna talking about changing MJ's look, followed by a quote of her talking about her evenings with him, "I begged him to throw out his sunglasses and he did because I was stronger than him. Then, we exchanged our powder brushes because we both powdwer our noses and we ended it by exchanging bank accounts."
But if in public Madonna treated Michael Jackson as if he was a weird and didn't hesitate to wink at reporters who asked questions, it didn't stop her trying to add his name among her list of celebrity lovers.
She'll admit to an ex-lover that she tried to seduce him. Nothing happened and he was one of the few men she had been unable to conquer.
Madonna, Q Magazine, April 2003,
Look on the bright side, you could be Michael Jackson. "I haven't seen that documentary [Living With Michael Jackson], but it sounds disgusting, like he [Martin Bashir] exploited a friendship. Publicly humiliating someone for your own gain will only come and haunt you. I can assure you, all these people will be sorry. God's going to have his revenge."
Friend of Michael's, Ahmad Elatab, New York Post, November 22, 2003
On the limo ride back, "I asked him about Madonna, seeing Lisa Marie Presley at the house one time, if he was gay, things like that," the teenager said.
"He was so open, he doesn't hide anything. He's a different person when you know him. He said Madonna's a bitch, and that he divorced Lisa Marie because she wouldn't have his kids."
Madonna : You can just dance for six hours and nobody will bother you and you don't have to drink. I felt an incredible sense of liberation, and I felt happier. That sense of freedom and feeling independent. I was used to dancing, but only when someone told you what to do. So in the nightclub I was all over the place, I combined everything. Street dance, modern dance, a bit of jazz and ballet, I was Twyla Tharp, I was Alvin Ailey, I was Michael Jackson. I didn't care, I was free. There was nothing fun or glamorous about my life and I needed some excitement. And believe me, there were a lot cooler people there than me. They were wearing black and not moving much, and I was giving everyone the retarded tingles.
Life With My Sister, Christopher Ciccone, published 2008
Fredy demann had arranged for madonna to shoot a video in Morocco. And when they drove back into town their van broke down. It was in the middle of the desert and they couldn't eat or drink cause it was Ramadan month and they had no were to go. At one point a song comes on the radio and the driver asks them have you heard of this pop singer named "Michael Jackson"? Madonna is stuck in-between a smelly driver and her dancers all crammed into a small van… and this guy is talking about Michael Jackson and Madonna starts cursing SHUT THE FUCK UP over and over.
50 Twins, August, 2008
June 25, 2009
"I can't stop crying over the sad news," Madonna says. "I have always admired Michael Jackson. The world has lost one of the greats, but his music will live on forever! My heart goes out to his three children and other members of his family. God bless."
The Mirror, 28 June, 2009
In 2006, he came close to moving to Britain - at the suggestion of on-off friend Madonna. The two were linked in the Nineties. Madonna's biographer said: "Many of the men in her life have been arm-candy. She flirted with Michael Jackson."
Madonna, PR Inside, July 4th, 2009
Madonna credits her "normal childhood" for not falling victim to superstardom like Michael Jackson - insisting having such a credible career so young was "unearthly".
The Material Girl superstar told the world of her grief after hearing of the Thriller hitmaker's death last week, confessing to fans she couldn't stop crying in the hours following his passing.
The tragic demise of her most famous contemporary came as an extra shock as she was putting plans in motion to make a special appearance at Jackson's London comeback gigs.
But the star will never have the chance to perform with Jackson - admitting it is a devastating blow as she has always looked up to him.
She tells Britain's The Sun newspaper, "I am so terribly sad about Michael Jackson's death. I don't know what artist wasn't inspired by him."
"To be able to do what he did at such an early age was unearthly, everybody grew up in awe of him."
Madonna looks back on her short-lived friendship with Jackson in the early 90s with fondness - insisting she loved to "pick his brains" about his musical talents.
She explains, "To work with him and become friends and hang out with him, was exciting for me. I used to love picking his brains about musical stuff."
And Madonna recognises she became a completely different person to Jackson despite similarities in their phenomenal success - blaming his tireless entertaining schedule when he was just a child.
She adds, "Obviously we have very different personalities - he was a lot more shy than I am. That's because I was allowed to have a normal childhood and he wasn't, so there was a vulnerable side to him that made you want to take care of him and protect him."
However, Madonna insists she will always remember both sides of Jackson - admitting the star completely changed when he stepped off stage.
She says, "He was a real paradox, one of the world's greatest performers and obviously very confident on stage, but in real life he was shy and you really felt for him. "
Madonna will pay tribute to Jackson with by involving a Jackson lookalike in her Sticky & Sweet tour when it returns to London's O2 Arena on Saturday.
The Sun, July 4th 2009
Madonna has revealed she was "in awe" of Michael Jackson, and is devastated by his sudden death last week.
Madonna is "terrible sad" about the death of Michael Jackson.
The '4 Minutes' singer is due to play London's O2 arena tonight (04.07.09) and tomorrow (05.07.09) - the venue where Michael would have staged his comeback shows later this month - and is planning to dedicate her performances to the King of Pop.
She explained: "He was the King who inspired us all. I am so terribly sad about Michael Jackson's death. I don't know what artist wasn't inspired by him. Everybody grew up in awe of him.
"To work with him and become friends and hang out with him, was exciting for me. I used to love picking his brains about musical stuff."
Michael - who died of a suspected cardiac arrest in Los Angeles last week, aged 50 - appeared alongside his brothers Jackie, Tito, Jermaine and Marlon in the Jackson 5 from the age of seven.
Madonna insists it was Michael's early induction into the world of fame which made him so unusual.
She told Britain's The Sun newspaper: "To be able to do what he did at such an early age was unearthly.
"Obviously we have very different personalities - he was a lot more shy than I am. That's because I was allowed to have a normal childhood and he wasn't, so there was a vulnerable side to him that made you want to take care of him and protect him.
"He was a real paradox, one of the world's greatest performers and obviously very confident on stage, but in real life he was very shy and you really felt for him."
Madonna also revealed she had offered to sing with Michael - who is survived by three children, Prince Michael, 12, Paris, 11, and seven-year-old Prince Michael II - at the 50 shows he had planned in London.
She joked: "I don't know what we could have done together. I could have carried his bags for him maybe."
Now, the 50-year-old singer has decided to pay tribute to Michael during her upcoming shows.
Madonna Touring Poland, 16 August 2009
During the concert, Madonna also paid tribute to Michael Jackson, who died in June.
A Jackson impersonator did the King of Pop's signature moonwalk dance move while wearing a sequined jacket, white T-shirt, white glove and white socks, while a large photograph of him as a boy appeared on stage.
"Let's give it up for one of the greatest artists the world has ever known," Madonna shouted, and then segued into a performance of her old hit "Holiday."
2 Setptember, 2009
The Net has been abuzz for a bit that Madonna will make an appearance at the Video Music Awards in New York next weekend. Even though the queen's rep shot down that possibility to Marc Malkin last week, we hear MTV isn't ready to give up. So how might they entice Madge to hop onboard the very hyped show this year? By dangling the M.J. card, obviously.
We hear the VMAs are going to have a "big" Michael Jackson component, and execs are dying for Madonna to pay tribute to the King of Pop, because really, who else can?
Sunday Times Culture, 20 September, 2009
The 36 songs on Celebration document the succession of skilfully selected producers and writers -John "Jellybean" Benitez, Steve Bray, Pat Leonard, William Orbit, Mirwais, Stuart Price - Madonna has worked with during her career. Other collaborations - with Prince, with Michael Jackson - either went off like a damp squib or failed entirely. Of the Jackson collaboration, she says: "We spent a chunk of time together, and became friends, but it never happened. I wrote a bunch of words and presented them to him, and he didn't want to go want to be provocative. And I said, `Well, why come to me?' I mean, that's like asking Quentin Tarantino to not put any violence in his films. I felt like he was too inhibited, too shy. Well, I'm shy too. When you're writing with somebody, you immediately become shy, because, unless you're already good friends, you can't be honest and say, 'That's the shittest thing I've ever heard: You're afraid to say that you don't like something because you don't want to hurt their feelings, or you're afraid your ideas are shit; and if you reveal those cards, they're not going to want to work with you." Surely any musician in the world, I think, would kill to work with her. But of course that's not the point. Madonna needs to want to work with them. It's never the other way around.
"The first thing that came into my head," she continues, referring now to Jackson's death, "was the word 'abandoned. I feel like we all abandoned him and put him in a box and labelled him as a strange person. And it used to pain me to see people go write such horrible things about him, accuse him of being a child molester, and all these things that nobody had any proof of - because, you know, I've had plenty of things I've been accused of. When I adopted David, I was accused of kidnapping him, for God's sakes; and it's very hurtful, and people love to jump on bandwagons. The lynch-mob mentality is pretty scary."
As Madonna said in her tribute to Jackson at last week's MTV awards, she lost her mother at six, and he lost his childhood. Both engaged in a long search for something to fill those gaps. Madonna is still looking, but alive. Something armoured her on that journey that was missing in Jackson. What advice would she give to her 24-year-old self, about to release her first single and blast into the limelight? "Don't take it personally," she answers without a pause.
19 October, 2009
Britney Spears was featured in a video clip during "Human Nature" in your Sticky & Sweet show. She's stuck in an elevator and starts to go crazy. Is that how you analogize what's happened in her career?
Yes. Didn't that explain what I thought? "I'm not your bitch, don't hang your shit on me." I just think people should mind their own business and let her grow up. I think everyone goes off the deep end at one time or another, and she, like Michael Jackson, didn't really have a childhood, so there are some inherent problems in that scenario. I have a lot of compassion for her, and I hope that she can find balance in her life. I don't know how bad her meltdown was. One can't believe everything one reads
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